Chapter 2 - The Watch in the Rain
Three weeks later, Chicago woke beneath a hard silver sky.
Clare had taken a Saturday shift because overtime could cover Oliver’s specialist consultation.
She was leaving the hospital with a paper cup of coffee when she noticed something shining near the curb.
At first, she thought it was a coin.
Then she bent down.
It was a watch.
Gold.
Old.
Heavy.
The leather strap was cracked with age.
Clare wiped rain from the face and froze.
She had seen it before.
Sebastian had worn it only once in front of her, but she remembered the worn engraving on the back.
S.L.
A black limousine sped past the hospital entrance.
Clare looked toward it.
Then back at the watch.
“Seriously?”
She called Gabriel.
He answered immediately.
“Where are you?”
“Hospitals should have normal hours.”
“Clare.”
“I found something.”
“What?”
“Sebastian’s watch.”
Silence.
“Don’t touch it.”
“You’re a little late.”
“Where exactly?”
She gave him the location.
“Stay inside.”
“I’m standing at the entrance.”
“Clare, listen to me. Do not go anywhere.”
The phone went dead.
She stared at the screen.
Then she saw a man across the road.
Black coat.
Gray umbrella.
Watching her.
Clare’s instincts screamed.
She walked back inside.
Five minutes later, Gabriel arrived with two men.
His face was pale.
“Give it to me.”
Clare handed him the watch.
He turned it over.
The engraving was visible.
“Where did you find it?”
“Outside.”
“It was on his wrist last night.”
“What?”
Gabriel looked at her.
“Mr. Lombardi was attacked.”
Clare felt cold.
“How bad?”
“Alive.”
“Where?”
“I can’t tell you.”
“Gabriel.”
“He’ll kill me if I break protocol.”
“He can threaten me later.”
Gabriel stared at her for a long moment.
“You need to understand what this watch means.”
“I understand that it belonged to him.”
“No.”
Gabriel lowered his voice.
“The watch was in the room when Sebastian’s father died.”
Clare said nothing.
“It disappeared afterward. Sebastian never found it.”
“But he said his father gave it to him.”
“He did.”
“Then why did you say he never found it?”
“Because Sebastian believed someone stole it the night his father was murdered.”
The word hung between them.
Murdered.
Clare had always known Sebastian’s family history was ugly. Lombardi was a name associated with shipping, warehouses, nightclubs, security companies, and rumors no newspaper dared print directly.
But murder was different.
“Who killed him?”
Gabriel looked toward the entrance.
“We don’t know.”
“Then why are you afraid of this watch?”
“Because if it has returned now, it means whoever took it wants Sebastian to know they are ready.”
Clare swallowed.
“Maybe someone just found it.”
Gabriel almost smiled.
“That would be a miracle.”
That afternoon, Clare was taken to Sebastian’s secure penthouse.
The attack had left him with a shallow cut along his jaw and bruising near his shoulder.
He looked furious.
Not frightened.
Furious.
“Where is it?”
Gabriel placed the watch on the table.
Sebastian stared.
For several seconds, he didn’t breathe.
“Where did you get that?”
Clare answered.
“I found it outside the hospital.”
His eyes snapped toward her.
“You touched it.”
“Yes.”
“Did anyone see you?”
“I don’t know.”
Sebastian closed his eyes.
Then he whispered, “My father’s initials.”
“I know.”
“You know nothing.”
“Then tell me.”
He looked at her.
The room was full of armed men.
None of them mattered in that moment.
Sebastian pushed himself forward in his chair.
“My father was killed in front of me.”
Clare’s expression softened.
“I’m sorry.”
“He had the watch on his wrist.”
“Did you see the killer?”
“I saw a shadow.”
“And then?”
“My mother was shot.”
Clare went still.
“Your mother too?”
“She survived for three hours.”
Sebastian’s jaw tightened.
“She told me one thing.”
“What?”
“Never trust a man who knows your father’s favorite song.”
Clare frowned.
“That sounds strangely specific.”
“It was.”
“What happened next?”
“Everyone around my family started dying.”
Clare looked at the watch.
“Maybe there’s something inside.”
Sebastian’s eyes shifted.
“What?”
“An old watch. Missing for ten years. Returned at the exact moment someone attacked you.”
She pointed toward it.
“Does it still work?”
“No.”
“Then open it.”
Gabriel immediately objected.
“That could be a trap.”
“Everything around me is a trap,” Sebastian said.
He nodded toward the watch.
“Open it.”
A technician arrived.
The back plate was removed.
Inside was the movement.
Nothing unusual.
Then the technician tilted the casing.
A tiny compartment was hidden beneath the inner rim.
Inside was a micro-SD card.
The room went silent.
Clare whispered, “There.”
Gabriel looked at her.
Sebastian stared at the card.
“Get me a secure reader.”
Minutes later, they opened the first file.
It contained audio.
Static.
Rain.
Then a man’s voice.
Sebastian recognized it instantly.
His father.
“If you’re hearing this, I’m already dead.”
Sebastian’s hand tightened around the chair.
The recording continued.
“The person closest to me is the person you must fear.”
A click.
Then another voice.
A younger voice.
A man speaking to someone else.
“Once the boy is out of the way, the company will be mine.”
Sebastian stopped breathing.
He knew that voice too.
Gabriel looked at him.
“Who?”
Sebastian answered in a whisper.
“My uncle.”
The recording ended.
Clare looked at Sebastian.
His face had gone completely empty.
For the first time since she had met him, she understood that the terrifying man everyone feared could still be a son standing in the ruins of an old betrayal.
“Your uncle has been dead for seven years,” she said.
Sebastian turned toward her.
“Yes.”
“Then who was the man speaking?”
He looked at Gabriel.
Gabriel slowly reached for his phone.
“Mr. Lombardi.”
“What?”
“We have a problem.”
A new message had arrived.
One photograph.
A grave.
Underneath it was a message:
YOU BURIED THE WRONG MAN.
Sebastian’s breathing changed.
Clare stepped closer.
“We need to leave.”
“No.”
“They know where you are.”
“They always know.”
“Then why stay?”
Sebastian looked at her.
“Because they made one mistake.”
“What?”
“They returned the watch.”
He lifted it from the table.
“And now I know they’re afraid.”
That night, Sebastian moved his entire security operation.
Clare was assigned a driver.
She refused.
Sebastian called her personally.
“Take the driver.”
“I have my own car.”
“You have a child.”
“That isn’t an argument.”
“It is when someone is trying to use you to reach me.”
Clare closed her eyes.
“Oliver has school Monday.”
“I’ll arrange security.”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because I don’t want my son growing up believing everyone wears a gun.”
Silence.
Then Sebastian said something she never expected.
“Neither did I.”
Clare opened her eyes.
The call ended.
The next morning, Oliver found the old gold watch on Clare’s kitchen counter.
He picked it up.
“Mom?”
“What?”
“This is broken.”
“Yes.”
He turned it over.
“Why is there a flower engraved here?”
Clare took it from him.
A flower?
She had never seen one.
She examined the back under the kitchen lamp.
There, beneath the initials, almost erased by years of scratches, was a tiny symbol.
A four-petal flower.
Clare’s heart skipped.
She had seen that symbol before.
On a photograph in Sebastian’s house.
A photograph of his mother.
That afternoon, she returned to Sebastian.
“You need to see this.”
She placed the watch in his hand.
Sebastian stared at the engraving.
His entire expression changed.
“My mother.”
“What?”
“She wore this symbol on every letter she sent.”
“Letters to whom?”
He looked at Clare.
“That’s the problem.”
“Why?”
“Because every letter disappeared.”
A shadow moved in the hallway.
Gabriel appeared.
“We have visitors.”
Sebastian’s voice turned cold.
“How many?”
“Six.”
“Armed?”
“Yes.”
Clare looked around.
“Where’s the exit?”
Sebastian pointed toward a side corridor.
“Go.”
“I’m not leaving you.”
His eyes met hers.
“That wasn’t what I asked.”
Clare shook her head.
“You saved Oliver’s life by paying that bill. You think I’m going to leave because men with guns arrived?”
Sebastian stared at her.
Then, unexpectedly, he laughed.
“You really are insane.”
“Probably.”
Gunfire exploded somewhere downstairs.
Sebastian’s people moved instantly.
Gabriel pulled Clare behind a stone wall.
Sebastian drew a pistol from the side of his chair.
Clare stared.
“You carry a gun?”
“I’m a Lombardi.”
Another shot.
Then shouting.
A security alarm screamed.
Sebastian pushed himself toward the corridor.
Clare followed.
“Where are you going?”
“To protect what they came for.”
“Me?”
His eyes flicked toward her.
“Not just you.”
The answer stayed with her long after they escaped through the private garage.
Because for the first time, Clare wondered whether the danger surrounding Sebastian was no longer merely his.
Whether somehow, impossibly, she had become part of his war.
May you like
And whether the watch had not been returned to Sebastian at all.
Maybe it had been returned to her.
